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Hi everyone,

I was hoping to get some advice in terms of a good backup solution for our setup. We currently have 2 WIndows Server 2012 servers both running Hyper V. The primary one hosts our production server and the secondary one is strictly for a secondary active directory server, replication, and as a backup server. They are not clustered and both have separate hard drives as a proper SAN was too expensive.

We also have a Synology DS412+ NAS that will ideally host our back ups and a second Synology DS412+ that we want the data replicated to offsite.

Our goal is as follows:

Primary Server Replicates to Secondary Server using Hyper-V Replica for maximal up-time in case of crisis

The Primary Server and Secondary Server are backed up to the NAS

The NAS is then synchronized to an offsite location either with the backup software (preferred) or through the NAS software

Lastly I want to be able to do SQL Specfic backups and back that up to the secondary location and also the cloud.

So far I’ve been looking at Unitrends Enterprise Backup which seems to do most of what I need and I was wondering if any one has advice or experience with it? Are there other options that might fit the above requirements or is there any recommended hardware\software I should consider acquiring if need be.

I really appreciate any advice I can get from the community as I’m not very experienced in this area.

Cheers and thank you.

@Veeam_Software

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I don’t think you’ll go far wrong with any of those tbh.

For the SQL backups rather than get too hung up on using a SQL application agent keep in mind you can simply dump SQL databases and logs to flat file using SQL Servers inbuilt backup agent, and then grab those flat files as part of your regular backups.

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For Windows Server, Hyper-V, SQL specific backup, and offsite backup for your NAS take a look at Zetta’s backup and recovery solution.

Zetta enables you to have a single solution for both physical and virtual server backup, and doesn’t require any additional hardware, saving those costs.

You’ll get plenty of quality recommendations in this thread that will work, just a matter of trialing a few solutions, seeing the performance, and bottom line price.

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Cory - Thank you for considering Unitrends!

From what you’ve described above, you plan to house your backups on the same server as your secondary AD. Is this AD live at any time?

Do you have any physical clients in your environment? Also, is it important for you to protect your HOS as well as your GOS?

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Thank you so far everyone.

To answer Katie’s questions, the backups will be housed on the Synology file server which is separate from the primary and secondary server. I don’t believe there is enough space on the secondary to host the backups (60gb). The AD is live at all times in case the primary goes down.

I think it would be easier if i could backup the hosts and guests underneath it for quicker restore of the original settings on the hosts with updates, but it isn’t really the most necessary thing in the world and we could work without it.

Can Unitrends take the place of hyper-v Replica through backups every 5-15 minutes of the guest systems, or is that not recommended?

I have been working with your team to see if I can get a solution that meets my needs from Unitrends and am waiting on a call from support.

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Cory - Thanks for your response. Did you call our support team, or our sales team to engage with our pre-sales support team?

Unitrends should be able to take the place of the HyperV Replica with backups every 15 minutes and some types of backups as close as every minute. I’d like to have one of our technical resources chat with you about the options to make sure everyone is on the same page.

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I appreciate the speedy responses. Unitrends seems pretty amazing so far in terms of meeting my needs and is definitely at the top of my list, but I do have a few issues that stops us from immediately jumping on it.

I’ve been speaking to the Unitrends support team and it seems like UEB would not be able to take the place of Hyper V Replica since it can’t actually start a VM within a VM for instant recovery. I believe Veamm would be better at this.

My other concern with it is lets say my UEB software gets corrupted, alongside my secondary UEB software being corrected, it sounds like I’m basically out of luck and would be unable to use any of the backup files for anything. Lastly there’s currently no ability to synchronize data to multiple vaults, i.e. sync my SQL data to a 3rd location.

I was wondering if anyone knows how software like Backupexec, Arcserve, AppAssure compare, etc as my boss was inquiring about them, primarily Backupexec.

I once again really appreciate any help you’re able to provide.

Cheers

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Hello Cory,

I would not recommend you Backup Exec. It was good solution a years back from here - but now they cant handle win2012 and the release of the beta with 2012 support is delayed till may (beta!), you can point you boss to almost any tread in the backup community and find lots of concerns

As for Veeam B&R seems for me as the solution of choice when we are talking about virtual infrostructure.

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Our requirements are much less complex than yours. We had the unitrends base model for our modest requirements.

However i have recently had cause to use their support- and i can honestly say it is the best ive known. I wish all the vendors i have support contracts with are so responsive!.

Support is a big thing for me, if something goes wrong i want someone sorting things straight away.

If they can meet your requirements, id go with unitrends.

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Hello corysw, thank you for considering Veeam! Veeam is built for virtualization and works perfectly with Windows Hyper-V.

Usually we recommend to use Veeam replication for the most critical VMs, and some of our customers replicate 2 onsite hosts to each other.

Veeam is agentless, has built-in deduplication and compression. It makes image-level backups, and you will be able to restore separate files from a Hyper-V backup (watch this 2-minute video - Free On-Demand Training at Veeam University).

NAS, the cloud, external USB drives, etc. can be used as as a backup repository for your backups.

Please let me know if any questions will appear.

p.s. Spiceworks Community members are eligible to get a free 180-day NFR key for Veeam Cloud Backup (includes the functionality of Veeam Backup & Replication) and Veeam ONE (monitoring and reporting solution for virtualized environments).

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Cory - I did want to clarify on a couple of items form your last post:

  • Unitrends cannot perform instant recovery on our virtual appliances since this is spinning up a VM on top of a VM, but CAN perform instant recovery on our physical appliances
  • Using Unitrends you are able replicate to another site and archive your data to removable drive for DR purposes. I’m not sure how your system is configured, but if you’d like more information on how this works, please let me know.
  • We have a great competitive analysis on our website that you might want to take a look at.

Please let me know what other questions I can answer for you.

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Hello Cory,

May I also suggest that you take a look at the StorageCraft’s business continuity solution ? We’re known for our reliable backups and fast recovery in both physical and virtual environments. We can perform a very rapid recovery at both the physical host and the hypervisor client level.

In your environment you’d want to install the ShadowProtect software (licensed) on your primary and secondary server. Then you can install the free ImageManager 6 application to actively manage, verify backup images, and set retention policies for your servers. ImageManager will replicate your backups from your primary Synology DS412+ NAS to your offsite NAS and let you set bandwidth throttling thresholds for the replication.

We support and partner with VMware, MS Hyper-V, Citrix XenServer, Oracle’s VirtualBox and RedHat’s KVM hypervisors making it very easy to migrate from P2V/V2V/V2P/P2P using our patented Hardware Independent Restore technology.

Check us out to see how well we work for you. You can download a full-featured trial from our website to see for yourself how well we work before you buy.

Cheers!

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Thank you everyone for the responses and help from your individual teams.

Marla, are the backup files from Veeam dependent on the installation itself? I mean let’s say I lose my installation, can I still use the backup files I made to restore them elsewhere. Am I able to replicate Veeam to multiple sites, or replicate to a secondary server, and synchronize backups from one location to another, etc like my specs in the first post?

Katie, thank you again for the response and clarification. I understand archiving will backup the dpu state, but lets say my server crashes, but I still have the backup files and no archive I am basically out of luck from what I understand. I know the likelihood is extremely low of losing two sites, but it’s just a concern we have in the process of considerations.

Steven, I have also been reviewing Storagecraft. If I were to backup the two primary servers would it also be backing up the VMs beneath it so that I could also specifically restore a singular VM to another system? Can Image Manager replicate SQL Data specifically to a third site?

To everyone,

What are the advantages of an agentless backup vs agent? In anyones opinion would you consider ArcServ, Appassure, etc in this environment over the above solutions?

Once again I can’t thank everyone enough for all the help in finding the best solution for us.

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corysw, thank you for these questions!

Veeam Backup comes with the Extract utility that allows you to extract VMs from the backup to the latest restore point. It can be used as an independent tool on Windows computers as it does not require any interaction with Veeam Backup. Use it if backups are removed from Veeam Backup or the application is uninstalled at all (Veeam Technical Documentation)

Am I able to replicate Veeam to multiple sites, or replicate to a secondary server, and synchronize backups from one location to another, etc like my specs in the first post?

The short answer is yes. Veeam replication is a job-driven process, so all you need for replication to multiple sites is to set up several replication jobs with different destinations.

You can also backup to different destinations. I suggest you to:

  • Have regular local backups at the main site;
  • At the remote site - install and configure a veeam repository on a windows computer. Create another job to backup to the remote site.

What are the advantages of an agentless backup vs agent?

In agent-free solutions like Veeam Backup, agents are not used to perform or assist with backups, and agents are not used for recovery either.

Agent-based products require agents inside VMs for essential functions like granular recovery and application-consistent backups. What does it mean? It means that if agent licenses are included ‘for free”, agents add cost to backup and recovery. First of all, considerable time is required to deploy, monitor and maintain agents in every VM. Backup agents in VMs can also create compatibility issues and complicate troubleshooting for “real” VM workloads. The time required to maintain agents translates to real costs. Agents also consume server resources. Agents don’t protect powered-off VMs, newly provisioned VMs, VMs with outdated agents or missing prerequisites, VMs whose agents can’t communicate with the backup server (for example, due to network isolation), etc.

Veeam is an example of agent-free solutions, it performs advanced backup and recovery without the use of agents in VMs. This doesn’t mean that it lacks features – such as application-aware backup and recovery, application log truncation, granular application-item recovery, Windows guest file searching, or in-place restores – that agent-based backup tools require agents to deliver. It provides all these features and more without agents in VMs.

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Are the backup files from Veeam dependent on the installation itself? I mean let’s say I lose my installation, can I still use the backup files I made to restore them elsewhere.

As it has been already mentioned, you can. For doing it you should use standalone utility named extract.exe.

More information regarding this functionallity can be found in the corresponding User Guide (p.239).

Am I able to replicate Veeam to multiple sites, or replicate to a secondary server, and synchronize backups from one location to another, etc like my specs in the first post?

As an additional option to the one suggested by Maria, you can utilze Veeam Cloud Edition to take your backup files away to cloud and/or local shares. However, be aware that VB&R CE isn’t capable of catching changes on the block level and therefore it should be only used in case of forward incremental mode.

Otherwise, if it’s reversed incremental mode that is being used and you’re willing to constantly (after each job execution) update .vbk-file on remote location with the changes that have happened since the last job run, you should put into use something like RSync, that is built for block-level file synchronization.

If you decide to follow “Reversed incremental/ Rsync” way, don’t forget to enable previous naming convention in order to guarantee that only block level changes will be transferred by rsync and not the backup file as a whole. It can be done by the means of the regkey mentioned in the following topic:

Hope this helps.
Thanks.

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Furthermore, if you would use VB&R for backing/replicating SQL server, kindly enable Application Aware Image processing option along with transaction logs truncation.

First feature is a proprietary VB&R mechanism, which allows Veaam Backup and Replication to create transactionally consistent backup of a VM running VSS-aware applications (such as Active Directory, Microsoft SQL, Microsoft Exchange, Sharepoint) without powering them off. Not only does it ensure successful VM recovery, as well as proper recovery of all applications installed on the VM without any data loss, but also it notifies applications about them being backed up.

With the second one you can ensure correct backup of applications that use transaction logs. The logs can be truncated after every backup job, every successful backup or not truncated at all.

Thanks.

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Cory - You can choose to archive whatever backups you want/need - file level, baremetal, etc. We encourage you to archive both file level data and baremetal data since one without the other may not be very helpful. We have customers who only replicate and don’t vault and vice versa - each organization has to analyze their threat of data loss, full scale DR, and determine what an acceptable RTO (recovery time objective) is.

Agented vs Agentless Backups each have their pros and cons. Agentless backups cannot typically be used for file level restorations, whereas agented backups can cause performance issues on the network. Again, the big thing to consider is what is important in your environment and decide what makes the most sense for you. This blog pos t might interest you.

Let me know if you’d like to deep dive into these topics with an engineer.

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Steven, I have also been reviewing Storagecraft. If I were to backup the two primary servers would it also be backing up the VMs beneath it so that I could also specifically restore a singular VM to another system? Can Image Manager replicate SQL Data specifically to a third site?

Hello Cory,

Thank you for reviewing StorageCraft’s business continuity solution. I believe it’s a great product and will be a reliable and easy to use backup/recovery resource for you.

If you were to backup the two primary (host) servers you would also be backing up the client VMs on the host as well. This is an image-based backup so everything on your host will be backed up exactly as it exists in that point in time. This includes running services, custom configurations, installed applications (like your hypervisors), as well as your data (VMs). Keep in mind that the backup occurs at the host level so restoring from a backup of the host will provide you an instance of the host and any client VMs it is currently running.

Due to the nature of how hypervisors communicate VSS calls between the host and client we recommend as a best practice that you run a backup from the host and also run a backup from within each client. Some of our customers save money by purchasing the lower cost VM licenses and then only backing up the client at the client level. This will work, as long as you have another host to which you can restore individual clients. However, to be completely confident in your backup we recommend both a client level backup (for recovering individual machines) and a host level backup (for recovering an entire system).

ImageManager will replicate your backup images to a third site. This will definitely include your SQL data as it exists within the disk image. We are using an enterprise-level snapshot driver to quiesce the SQL database, transactions, logs, etc before taking the snapshot image so you can be sure that all of your SQL data is preserved in the backup image. We would replicate the image deltas to the third site at which point you could access the SQL data from within the backup image. We do not extract specific portions of a system from within an image (yet). If I were doing this I would probably use the free ImageReady tool to automatically mount the backup image, run a custom script against the SQL data, use ImageReady to send myself an automated report on the process and then automatically dismount the image. By the way, ImageReady is also a free tool just like ImageManager.

Thanks for the great questions.

Cheers

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What are the advantages of an agentless backup vs agent?

There are strong feelings in both camps on what the best backup solution is, so I’m going to make an effort to provide you with information so you can decide for yourself.

First, let me offer my opinion. Some people prefer the convenience agent-less backups offer because you don’t have to restart an operating system (aka production server) when setting up a backup. This would seem like a big plus in my mind. With an agent-based backup you will need to reboot a system after an install because the snapshot driver resides at the operating system kernel level and hence requires the OS to be restarted.

Agent-less backups actually use a technique called Dispatch Table Hooking which injects code into a running Windows OS system without requiring a reboot. This technique is sometimes employed by malware and has been explicitly discouraged by Microsoft’s kernel engineers as it can easily cause instability in the system resulting in system crashes and unrecoverable data corruption ( good reference here ).

Agent-less backups typically traverse the file system to determine changes for incremental/differential backups. This traversal can take longer and be more complex than the agent-based backup which has access to Change Block Tracking (CBT) at the kernel level. Agent-based backups will rely more heavily on local resources to pre-process and compress data before transmitting it to the storage device (NAS/SAN, local USB drive, or remote host). Agent-less backups will rely more heavily on network resources as they transmit application commands as well as data over the network.

Here are some more references:

Dell AppAssure published the " 5 Misperceptions of Agentless VMware Backup "
Asigra (a competitor of StorageCraft) published " Agentless Backup is Not a Myth "
StorageCraft published " Agent vs. Agentless Backup "
Kate at Symantec published " Agent and Agentless VM Backup and Recovery " which describes why you want to consider using agentless backups for VMs.
Greg Shields (Microsoft MVP) advocates agents in his paper, " VMware and Hyper-V Backups Agents vs Agentless Approach "
MSP industry leader Kaseya discusses " Agent vs Agentless System Management "

I want to note that Greg Shields’s article proposes agent-based backups when he was previously employed by Concentrated Technology and Dell. Greg is now employed by Veeam which offers VMWare backup software which is agent-less, and I have to wonder if he would still argue for agent-based backups.

I’m trying to be open and honest here to point out these disparities because there are strong arguments for either side. In my opinion, the single most powerful reason for running an agent-based system is that Microsoft seems to indicate that this is the way they intended the operating system to allow backups. Microsoft’s own backup software is an agent-based backup system. Since they authored the OS it makes sense that they would select the best way of implementing a backup application to run on that OS. On the other hand, they don’t prohibit agent-less backups and there are many products out there that are agent-less. In the end it may simply be a matter of understanding your specific environment and the pros/cons of an agent-less and agent-based system and then deciding which works best for you.

Personally, I think a well-informed decision is the best type of decision. So if I’ve helped to clear the waters (or muddy them?) at least you’re thinking and examining the options. Thank you for the good question.

Cheers!

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Steven, thank you for the feedback!

Could you please specify the source of the information stating that Greg is employed by Veeam?